The main weakness with all of the CDC-funded gun research is that it looked at gun violence as a disease, not as a crime. It is all well and good to speak metaphorically of “an epidemic of gun violence” but violence and crime are not really diseases. As a scientist in Maggie’s article says, “A gun is not a virus.” But the CDC-funded research into guns used an epidemiological model – the researchers asserted that a gun acted as a pathogen, like a virus or a bacteria, and would actually infect those who came into contact with it: infect them with the disease of violence. While it is true that the NRA fought to prevent more studies like these from being funded by the CDC, they didn’t really have to fight too hard, because most criminologists thought the studies were a waste of time and money, so Congress pulled the plug.